South Atlantic Modern Language Association

Telling Tales in Manuel Puig's "El beso de la mujer araa" Author(s): David H. Bost Reviewed work(s): Source: South Atlantic Review, Vol. 54, No. 2 (May, 1989), pp. 93-106 Published by: South Atlantic Modern Language Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3200553 . Accessed: 03/12/2011 15:12
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Talesin ManuelPuig's Telling El beso de la mujer arana

DAVID H. BOST

A STORY WITHIN A STORY is an ancient but TELLING effective recourse in Western literature. This technique allows the author to suspend momentarily his basic plot in order to articulate from a different perspective certain concerns that are suggested in the larger context. A brief pause in the primary story line allows for an amusing or illustrative digression that ultimately reflects back upon the original story. In this light, the inserted tale, anecdote, or story seldom if ever is an incidental occurrence within the novelistic framework; it is an imaginative insertion that reinforces fundamental issues embedded in the novel. El besode la mujer arana(1976) is a work that utilizes the structure of interior fictions more than any other Spanish American novel of recent years.' Puig's variation on this pattern is not to use anecdotes or mythology, which is often the case with this model of discourse, but films.2 Luis Molina's dialogue with Valentin Arregui is frequently given over entirely to telling about some of the many movies he has seen. What gives his stories special resonance--other than the fact that they provide an escape from their desperate situation-is that many of the movies he reconstructs somehow mirror his own condition. Molina's stories reveal a hidden, perhaps unconscious intention to speak about his deepest and darkest inner self. The movies he remembers and tells about deal with issues like identity, political consciousness, relationships, and self-sacrifice. These concerns are brought up in the extended conversations between the two prisoners and eventually lead to dramatic shifts of values in the two men. The stories allow them to witness through narrative the problems that continually confront them. Molina's tales are a form of psychological introspection in which one adopts a narration appropriate to his own circumstances. The movie plots function as manifestations of a

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symbolic order that represents each character's innermost burdens and anxieties. It may be something of an irony that Puig's reception by the English-speaking world is based primarily on Hector Babenco's 1985 movie Kiss of theSpiderWoman, a film that was highly instrumental in a making Puig literary celebrity. Yet perhaps it is fitting that the film version of El besode la mujer aranahas had so much to do with Puig's international stature as a writer, because movies are and always have been his first love. His obsession with films and their effect on popular culture appears throughout his novelistic career, beginning with La traicidn de Rita Hayworth in 1968. by Rita Hayworth) (Betrayed Thus it should come as no surprise that a great deal of this novel's critical reception has dealt with its relationship to film. Frances Wyers Weber has noted that Molina's stories are "so enchanting that we concentrate fully on both the speaker and what he tells us, on both visual texture and the perception and interpretation of that texture" (167). The novel deliberately plays with different kinds of representation, to be sure (Weber 167). The cinematic illusion that Puig creates through Molina is powerful and convincing. But we must remind ourselves that Molina is a narrator, not a director or cinematographer, and that his evocation of visual data appears in the novel as narrative, not as a real movie. Roberto Echavarren's study of the novel probes deeply into Molina's complex psyche. Lacking his own legitimate discourse, Molina the homosexual must live vicariously through the fictive artifice of film (Echavarren 68). Films represent for Molina, as they did for Puig growing up in the Argentine town of General Villegas, emblems of desire (Echavarren 68). The lives he has seen portrayed in movies represent ideal worlds of beauty and luxury. Molina's stories are the residual traces of shaping experiences that he had before his imprisonment. The stories taken from the films often parallel the novel'scentral action and thereby provide an insight into the deepest concerns of both Molina and Arregui. Molina's narrations are devices that uncover basic psychosocial issues with the two characters. The movies that Molina recalls are an interesting source of his stories. Three movies are from RKO productions of the 1940s: Cat with a Zombie Cottage (1943), and The Enchanted People(1942), I Walked Lewton with Val films are horror The first two by produced (1945). Jacques Tourneur as director. The other RKO film, a romantic fantasy, was produced by Harriet Parsons and directed by John Cromwell.3 RKO was a studio that gained a share of the movie-going market in the 1940s by marketing psychological thrillers produced by

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people like Lewton and Hitchcock. The remaining three movies are stories made up by Puig, composites of dozens of movies that appeared in Europe and Latin America in the 1930s and 1940s. It is natural for Puig to concentrate on movies of this era, for these are the movies of his youth, films that he has recently seen again and again on television (Coddou 13). Puig's particular selection of these movies pays homage to a style of movie-making reminiscent of a cinematic golden age. Molina's most pressing concern is with self-identity. He is, to say the very least, a marginal figure in an oppressive society that has no tolerance for even slight deviations from the authoritative norm. Fully conscious that he has been rejected by society, Molina uses films as a means of escape and, more importantly, as an occasion to identify with characters who have been attractively and dramatically displayed on screen. Molina's insecurities are assuaged somewhat by a close interaction with the characters in the films he summarizes, particularly with the heroines. Not surprisingly, he confesses early in the novel that he wishes he were a woman, a remark that sheds light on why he dwells excessively on the movie heroines. The films that best reflect the search for identity are CatPeople,I Walked with a Zombie, and the Nazi propaganda film. Each of these three stories presents the main character-a woman-in a slow, somewhat painful process of discovery. In Cat People, the revelation concerns the discovery of Irene's true self- a person who metamorphoses into a panther when her sexual desire becomes aroused. The story about zombies deals with a wife's discovery of her husband's past. It is her knowledge of his true identity that provides the dramatic tension. The propaganda film portrays a woman in the process of political and social awakening. The plot is constructed around her gradual acceptance of what is presented as the economic, moral, and political superiority of the Third Reich. These three films provide Molina a safe haven to examine the problems associated with being a homosexual in a heterosexual society. The novel begins in the middle of Molina's narration of CatPeople, a suggestion that this internal story has particular significance for the imprisoned man. Irene's basic plight is painfully familiar to Molina. She is also a social outcast who appears unable to function adequately in a heterosexual relationship. It is, in fact, Irene's sexuality that provides the key to understanding her own true nature. Irene fears that extreme intimacy will transform her into a panther. Her beliefs are based on stories she heard as a child in her country, tales about panther women that always terrified her. Her marriage uncon-

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summated, she visits a psychiatrist to try to discover the source of her fears. The therapy sessions uncover her true identity, but with gruesome results: she becomes a panther and mutilates the unsuspecting doctor. After terrorizing a possible rival for her husband's affections (his young and beautiful assistant), Irene is killed by a panther after releasing it from its cage in the city zoo. It is clear that Molina and Irene are outside the social mainstream of normal sexual behavior. And both long for something they cannot have-an enduring relationship. It is the realization of sexual desire that leads to the demise of both characters: Molina cannot discreetly channel his urges and is jailed for corrupting a minor; and Irene becomes a violent animal at the height of her passion. Each act is an unacceptable response in a society with clearly defined sexual codes. The connection between the two is strongest, perhaps, in the discourse of their origins. The crux of the movie entails Irene's acceptance of the legends she heard years earlier about a race of women who were like panthers. The restaurant scene in which a woman speaks to Irene in her own language has a special dramatic intensity, for it is then that Irene feels obliged to tell the story of the cat people, a legend that comes to life in her. The origins of Molina's sexual identity are presented as a scholarly note. Puig's recurring footnotes on the theories of homosexuality are designed to deepen our understanding of its possible causes and the development of sexual determinants.4 These explanations function like Irene's legend in that they provide background information that accounts for Molina's psychosocial development. Both Irene'sstory and Puig's extended note reveal distinct aspects of a heavily-layered text that assigns the reader differing roles throughout the novel. Readers are challenged to react accordingly to the wide variance of narrative forms constantly served up for their consumption.5 Irene is thus a possible alter-ego for Molina. In a strongly Foucauldian sense, both are at the fringes of their society's conventions of sexual conduct. It is no coincidence that Irene is an artist and Molina a window-dresser. They are presented as characters who are creative, intuitive individuals who find it difficult to function within the designs of their sexuality. To underscore more emphatically how different she is, Molina points out that Irene is a foreigner; her accent, appearance, and customs are emblems of a singularity that is not easily molded into a pattern of social conformity. Molina and Irene are products, or perhaps victims, of forces they cannot control (Mufioz 367). Their existence is predicated on a system of values that is inverted. Love is a process that leads not to life but to death: a

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figurative death for Molina, since society shuns him because of his sexual activity; a virtual one for Irene, whose kiss leads to an embrace of death. The problem of identity is also critical in I Walked with a Zombie. The need for an explanatory origin is shifted from the heroine, however, to the hero. Nevertheless, it is her job to search out and comprehend his identity, a process that leads to a tragic conclusion, as in Cat People.It is a structural requirement of many horror films that such an investigative process occur. The protagonist must first discover the gruesome truth about a situation or individual; the communication of this reality leads both to the formation of allies as well as to the identification of enemies. The resolution generally entails the neutralization of the evil forces. Puig's liberal adaptation of this film about zombies dwells at length on the woman's probing into her husband's past. She searches for explanations to his erratic mood changes and binges of drunkenness. She discovers that her husband is a co-conspirator in the creation of an army of zombie workers. Molina's tale describes how her awareness of her husband's past life leads to an active and violent resolution of the unholy existence of the living dead. The conspirators die, the zombies are released from their spell and re-die, and the woman escapes from the island, unharmed but wiser to the ways of supernatural forces. It would seem that such a movie about such far-fetched topics as voodoo zombies would have little to do with the novel's central focus, apart from the revelation of personality that Molina and Valentin both offer to one another. The movie indeed concentrates upon the importance of knowledge of the other, a process in the novel that determines the course of their extended conversation. However, if we view the placement of this narration contextually, we see that Valentin is interested in bringing Molina into the discourse of politics, an invitation that Molina is at first reluctant to accept. Yet Molina's movie-story is, on one level at least, a story of liberation. It is possible to view the plight of the zombies as a metaphorical tale of oppression, sacrifice, and ultimate liberation through the overthrow of tyranny. The woman is the necessary catalyst for change. Her penetration beyond the veil of apparent stability and harmony reveals a corrupt, wicked dictatorship fomented in part by her husband. Her increasing knowledge of the economic and political operation of the island forces a termination of the persecution. Although the two prisoners never discuss the movie, this inserted narration is immediately followed by Valentin's interest in seeing Molina politically involved. This scene in turn is followed by their physical union. The movie-story thus antici-

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pates thematically part of what Jonathan Tittler terms the "double Quixotification" that unfolds in the novel (198). "Molina takes on qualities of Arregui," writes Tittler, "while Arregui engages in homosexual activity with his cellmate" (198). Both are apprentices of the other. Molina's choice, however, to move from politics in film to politics in the real world is a tragic decision. Little has prepared him for the rough-and-tumble world of Latin American political conflict where defeat may mean imprisonment, exile, or death. Molina's narration of zombies is thus interwoven into the novel on a thematic level. The heroine in the zombie movie is, like Molina, initially on the periphery of political activity. Yet knowledge of the other leads both Molina and the woman into a posture of action: Molina accepts the phone number and willingly calls Valentin's associates; the woman learns all she can about her husband's past, no matter how painful it is to her; and she participates in the downfall of the hideous regime of zombie laborers. Molina and the woman are both activists, but in a limited sense. They are both drawn into the political maelstrom through their relationship with their mates. By fully comprehending the identity of the other, both Molina and the woman become at least partially committed to following through with consequences of this intimate knowledge. Yet their political involvement is extremely short-lived. Molina is gunned down, and the woman escapes from the island on the ship that earlier brought her there. I Walked is told at a point in the novel in which Molina with a Zombie approaches his maturation as a political activist. This process begins much earlier when he tells Arregui the story of Leni, a Parisian show girl during the Nazi occupation of France. Puig's version is modeled on the archetypal Nazi film. It is propaganda designed to promote the National Socialist Party at the expense of its declared enemies Jews, Marxists, and liberals, among others. Molina, however, cannot see beyond the appearance of glamour and beauty exemplified by Leni. He is carried away by her costumes, the set design, the exotic locations, and above all, the suggestion of romance. Valentin brings the narrative into sharper focus by informing Molina that the film is nothing but Nazi trash. Valentin's semiology of the cinema is more critical than Molina's, especially regarding political theory. We must remember that Molina and Valentin apprehend these stories in completely different ways. For Molina, the stories are a verbalization of what has been for him an overwhelmingly visual experience. of the text is determined by his powerful Valentin's Konkretisation convictions as a political and social activist. His participation and

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reception of the stories thus emphasize criteria that Molina disregards or is simply unaware of.6 Valentin is presented in the novel as a reader.He often studies his political texts in order to deepen his commitment as a militant opponent of the current regime. He responds to Molina's stories with the same critical acuity he would use in reading his political commentaries. Valentin is an active, participatory audience whose reception of the story is emblematic of a phenomenological completion and interpretation of the text. The two characters form a relationship based upon the process of literary creation and transmission. Unperturbed by Valentin's remarks, Molina tells his tale of love and intrigue. Leni's history is narrated on two levels: first by Molina; next in a footnote that masquerades as an "official"press release that accompanied the distribution of the film. Leni is torn between her patriotic feelings for France and her love for Werner, a young officer in the occupying German army. Her affection for Werner leads her to question her devotion to France and the underground resistance movement. The Free French are portrayed as evil, scheming saboteurs who lack the necessary vision to accept the inevitable: a fascist world ruled by Aryan lords. Leni's political conversion occurs when she goes to Germany to make films and talks with Werner about the moral implications of killing others, a necessary part of the young officer's work. Werner's response is to show Leni-through film, naturally -the "truth"about global economic issues. The documentary he shows Leni is a perverse anti-Semitic piece of propaganda, but Leni is convinced that Germany's destiny will be hers also. Leni's particular political choice is exactly the opposite of Molina's. The point is that each one makes a deliberate, conscious decision to support an identifiable cause. Molina is a victim of what is certainly a fascist regime. His political choice aligns him with the real-world counterpart of the underground resistance movement that he describes in his film. Valentin functions as the documentary film when he tells Molina the truth about his involvement with the forces of liberation that are in total conflict with the current government. This film initiates for Molina a protracted fall from political innocence. As much as he resists both the prison authorities and Valentfn, he, like Leni, finally joins the legions ofjustice. Although his role is a small one (he is just a messenger), he dies as a direct consequence of his political involvement. Molina's conflicts are very similar to Leni's. He is caught in a web of deceit and manipulation with his arrangement with the warden. Leni is also forced to deal with people of questionable integrity when she negotiates with the French under-

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ground. Both Molina and Leni are helplessly in love with spokesmen of an ideology. And both are sacrificed on the altar of subterfuge, victims in a struggle for political supremacy. Puig's story of Leni is, unlike the previous two, his own. Yet there is a note of historical authenticity in the name of his heroine. Leni Lamaison is perhaps an echo of Leni Riefenstahl, one of Germany's most important film makers during the Nazi era who was captured at the end of the war and imprisoned for her contributions to the Nazi cause.7 Puig has embodied historical fact in his novel, but with important inversions. Puig's narration is a composite of many Nazi documentaries, some by Riefenstahl, others by lesser-known producers and directors. This historical foundation enters into the novel, however, as an adapted function of narrative. Fact blends with fiction in Puig's eclectic use of history, film, scientific literature, and other forms of prosaic discourse. As Frances Weber notes, in Puig's novels "everything is at the service of plot" (173). The three aforementioned stories function in the novel as emblems of Molina's personal needs and circumstances. The other three movies also reflect aspects of his life, but in a more relational sense. The story of the homely girl and the disfigured aviator (adapted from the movie about the young racer, and the film TheEnchanted Cottage), about the journalist and actress present characters whose primary concerns are with their relationships. Clearly, these films for Molina represent a utopic, romantic view of love, family, and commitment. They symbolize a kind of stability that is unreachable due to his imprisonment as well as to his sexual preference. is the most idealized film of the novel and the TheEnchanted Cottage only one Molina does not tell to Valentin. The movie's narration is part of an extended interior monologue that is interspersed with Molina's thoughts on his trial, the shame he inflicted upon his mother, and memories of his ideal, unattainable love - the waiter. In this way the unspoken, jumbled narrative achieves a consistency with the plot of the novel. The movie-story is a romantic fantasy. A World War I pilot is horribly disfigured and ends up marrying a young but plain servant girl. They come to live in a small New England cottage where a miracle is performed; their love for one another transforms them into beautiful people. The power of love enables them to look into the soul of the other, thus altering their perception. They are not limited to a sensory apprehension of beauty. Outsiders do not understand this potential and cannot witness the change. To them, nothing has happened. The lovers create and live in a world of their own, immune to the cruelties and offenses of the less sensitive.

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Arregui is initially one of these outsiders. Molina deliberately withholds this story from him because he fears that his cellmate will ridicule him. Perhaps Molina feels that the possibility of love between two individuals brought together by chance is too ridiculous to present. The movie thus embodies a desire as-of-yet unrevealed. In the course of the novel, however, Valentin ultimately replaces the waiter as Molina's ideal partner. Molina comes to accept his cellmate and his ideas, a far cry from his thoughts about Valentin at an earlier part of the novel: "...este hijo de puta y su puta mierda de revoluci6n" (116). Ironically, the sordid prison functions as the enchanted cottage, for their extended confinement allows them to see within the other qualities that initially were hidden. It is a gesture of affection and respect when each acquires some of the characteristics of the other. Molina, writes Tittler, "discovers that he is not inferior to heterosexuals, and that he is even capable of some nobility" (198). This he learns under the tutelage of Valentin. The political prisoner is also transformed through his relationship with Molina into a more humane, sharing person. The movie symbolizes the reciprocal nature of a fulfilling relationship, one in which the needs of the other become a primary factor. Molina and Arregui eventually see in each other characteristics that have been hidden or latent. Their relationship ultimately permits them the opportunity to reach outward to each other, much the same as the couple in The Enchanted Cottage. They provide for one another a momentary security in an environment of hostility and risk. They are like the movie couple in that their relationship is a protective shield that guards them from danger. Molina expresses this feeling to Valentin in one of their last conversations: -Y es que cuando me quedo solo en la cama ya tampoco soy vos, soy otra persona, que no es ni hombre ni mujer, pero que se siente .... -... fuera de peligro. -Si, ahi esta, jc6mo lo sabes? -Porque es lo que siento yo. (238) Molina's remark suggests that his identity is no longer gender-bound, a transformation that is possible because of his association with Valentin. And how can Valentin possibly complete Molina's thought? His identification with his partner has become so total that they now think like one. Relationships often lead to one's sacrificing his or her needs for the

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other. This is the theme of the Mexican film that Molina tells Valentin. His story, a fictitious creation of Puig, is about the forbidden love between a journalist and an ex-actress, the mistress of a powerful gangster. The journalist, knowing that his paper is going to print a scandalous expose on the actress, destroys the printing presses and is thus ruined professionally for life. He becomes a drunken vagabond with little concern for his own well-being. She searches him out and supports him during his extended convalescence; she is able to do this only by prostituting herself. By the time she can provide for both of them legitimately (the gangster has returned her priceless jewels to her), it is too late. His physical condition has seriously deteriorated, and he is terminally ill. There is nothing that she or his doctors can do to save him, and he dies in her arms. The parallels between this generic melodrama and the novel are obvious. Throughout their confinement Molina has sacrificed for Valentin. He has fed him, nursed him, entertained him, and manipulated the authorities on his behalf. His final sacrifice, the communication of the message to Valentin's associates, is a fatal risk. Valentin also makes sacrifices for Molina. His movement from hostility and rejection to acceptance of Molina is a dramatic change of attitude, a sacrifice of what may be thought of as a traditional male identity. Valentin is a product of a society in which male roles have been clearly delineated. His union with Molina is a symbolic cross-over from typical Latin machismo to an acultural androgyny. What counts between them is that they have discovered a common strain of humanity that unites them-one that is neither male nor female. Valentin unwittingly participates in the dismantling of an ancient but powerful traditional belief that males must be cold, distant, and unsharing. After Molina narrates this film to him, Valentin openly remarks on the significance of the story: she is happy to have had one true relationship in her life, even though it did not last. Valentin is speaking of the film, but on another level he is talking about himself and Molina. Their confinement together is about to end, and Valentin feels the need to comment upon the importance of their relationship. It is easier for Arregui to acknowledge these feelings indirectly through a commentary on the film. Molina is more open and can tell Valentin directly how much he means to him: "Valentin, vos y mi mama 'son las dos personas que mas he querido en el mundo" (265). The film on the Mexican couple gives Molina and Valentin an appropriate context and vocabulary for this their last conversation. The film on the racer deals more with parental relationships than

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with amorous ones. A young South American has come to Europe to race in the prestigious 24 Hoursof Le Mans. His wealthy father is in Europe too, and we learn that the two are polarized because of their political beliefs. The son is sympathetic to the plight of the workers on his father'splantation; the father supports his son's racing career to keep the boy away from the volatile political community of their country. The father returns home and is kidnaped by guerrillas. His son works to free him; he is, after all, a supporter of their cause. But there are some final complications and the father is killed. This film draws Valentin out more than any other story Molina tells. Valentin confides to Molina that he and his mother do not agree about politics. Like the son in the movie, Valentin has rejected many of the values that his mother holds sacred. Arregui's political rebellion is therefore projected in a different light with these revelations of family history. He is struggling not only against the injustices of society in general, but also against an identity imprinted upon him by his parents. Valentin is also a product of a materialistic society that he has attempted to disown and undermine. Yet like the auto racer, he too dreams of successes within the world he rejects. Valentin's idea of a perfect mate, for instance, is a European woman who sympathizes with a Latin American revolutionary; she also knows about fine wines, elegant dress, and the etiquette of entertainment. Valentin is caught between two worlds. His interior monologue suggests that he has not completely divorced himself from the values of the people who now oppress him. He, like Molina, is experiencing an intense personal struggle for identity and individuated values. This movie's significance extends beyond developing the novel's characterization: it is a commentary on the novel's plot. Molina seems a bit confused about how it ends. He first says that the guerrillas kill the father when they discover that they have been tricked by the son. In his other version, however, he says that the father is killed in a shootout with the police after the terrorists free him. It makes no difference which ending is "correct," for taken together they perfectly anticipate Molina's final plight. Molina, like the father, is killed in a crossfire between the urban guerrillas and the police. He has been freed, but it is a dangerous freedom. Outside the prison walls, Molina never has the chance to gain the trust of Valentin's comrades or to continue to deceive the police as effectively as before. His freedom therefore leads to a sudden loss of control over his environment and circumstances. The movie functions as an anticipatory scene in which Molina unknowingly tells a story of his

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own death, an inevitable conclusion considering the power and hatred of the opposing forces. Molina's stories in El besode la mujerarana are powerful tools of literary characterization. In the absence of a third-person descriptive narration, the films tell us things about the two characters that we can only infer from their conversations. The interior film-fictions of El besode la mujer arana,as well as the other forms of discourse that are utilized in the novel, create a kaleidoscopic novelistic reality that typifies modern Spanish-American literature. Puig, like many of his contemporaries, combines an unusual array of narrative forms to create a novel of eclectic design. Yet in spite of the technical virtuosity that Puig has displayed with this novel, it would be a mistake not to see the underlying thematic unities and parallels that emerge in Molina's stories and in the lives of the prisoners. The numerous narrative strands dispersed throughout Puig's text uncover hidden aranais a novel identities and ambiguous intentions. El besode la mujer written in the tradition of Spanish-American social realism. The novel consequently celebrates the dynamics of social, political, and individual liberation through the unveiling of inner portraits of desire. FurmanUniversity

NOTES
'Since its inception, Spanish-American literature has relied upon the interpolated narrative to add an imaginative dimension to its exposition. The earliest chroniclers of the discovery and conquest of America inserted into their historical accounts short anecdotes, legends, tales of fantasy and myth, and humorous stories. As Enrique Pupo-Walker suggests, these narrative asides often communicate the informative content of the chronicle more effectively than the purely documentary material: "Observaremos mas de una vez que son muchas las relaciones en que esos nucleos de ficci6n alcanzan un grado sorprendente de inmanencia constitutiva. Y son, bien esta decirlo, los espacios mas refinados que logra el prop6sito informativo en la historia" (27). More recently, Spanish-American novels have included internal stories to illustrate a particular point in the text. In a wellknown case, Don Segundo Sombra tells his young protege stories that help the novice understand his development as a responsible member of gaucho society (see Camaruti, Blasi, and McGrady). Guiraldes chooses mythology and folklore as the narrative vehicles of his lesson because they are essentially oral forms of communication that are appropriate in a preliterate society. The film-stories in El besode la Sombraand the legends of the colonial mujerarana are, like the myths of Don Segundo within a tradition with his narrative innovates an of emblems chronicles, age. Puig adaptations of a contemporary art form. Films are to the late twentieth century

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what folklore and myth were to the colonial era-expressions of popular tastes. 2Film is a manifestation of an age of media-consciousness. Molina brings his stories of films into the prison as a means of undermining the hierarchical authority of his society. He disturbs the traditional "sense of place" that often divides a society into isolated clusters of informational units (Meyrowitz). Though imprisoned and removed from the world, he brings with him a form of public communication whose very nature violates the intended function of incarceration: isolation. His film-stories allow him to flee momentarily from his situation and participate again in a form of public discourse. 3It was not unusual for a small ensemble of people to work together on a number of films produced by the same studio. For example, Roy Webb composed the musical score for all three of these RKO productions; Mark Robson edited both of the horror films; Dewitt Bodeen wrote the screenplay for The EnchantedCottageand Cat People;C. Bakaleinikoff was the music director for I Walked with a Zombie and The EnchantedCottage;and Albert S. D'Agostino worked on these two as art director. Actor Tom Conway portrayed Paul Holland in I Walkedwith a Zombie (the plantation owner) and was the psychiatrist in Cat People (see Nash). 4Puig enthusiastically defends his use of such clarifying notes: ". . el hecho mismo de la experimentacion me entusiasma: 'porque no introducir notas aclaratorias al pie de pagina? que regla de oro hay que prohiba utilizar ese procedimiento en una obra de ficci6n? Me pareci6 una forma valida . . . y la emplee" (Coddou 12). This is only one of many ways in which Puig has abandoned traditional forms of narration (Coddou 12). 5Lucille Kerr's recent study of four of Puig's novels describes lucidly how the reader experiences the shifting fictions within Puig's oeuvre. In addition to the dialogues, film summaries, and footnotes, El besode la mujerarafa employs interior monologues, letters, and official police dispatches. The lack of a single narrative voice is highly indicative of a deconstruction of traditional loci of authority. The novel thus combines form with content to create a vision of political and sexual liberation. Regarding the latter, Puig notes: ". .. no habra liberaci6n verdadera que no incluya la liberacion sexual" (Coddou 12). 6Molina's role in the novel as both a narrator of and listener to the stories is very complex. He is simultaneously a creator and recipient of his own verbal creations. It is Valentin who attempts to encode Molina's tales with a coherent meaning. The novel presents the two characters in an extended process of convergence regarding the interior fictions. Author, narrator, text, and listeners cohere to realize an imaginative literary intention. The metaphor of convergence is useful in determining the dynamics of characterization throughout the novel. Convergence occurs with the stories, on a physical level, on a political level, and also in terms of their personality. 7Leni Riefenstahl has been judged as a person who was torn between political morality and art, a victim, like Leni Lamaison and Molina, of powers and circumstances beyond her control. She was an artistic genius who, unlike many of her contemporaries, chose to remain in Germany during the Third Reich and support the state with her cinematic gifts. Her most unforgettable work portrayed Germany in a very positive light; Olympia(1938), for example, is a documentary on the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, and exhibited Germany as an advanced, civilized country. Riefenstahl was criticized for producing soft-core propaganda for the Nazis in this and other films, a charge she always denied (Infield 150, 159).

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David H. Bost

WORKS CITED
Blasi, Alberto. "Mito y escritura en Don SegundoSombra."Revista Iberoamericana 44 (1978): 125-32. Camaruti, Mireya. "Funci6n literaria del cuento intercalado en Don SegundoSomRevista Iberoamericana 37 (1971): 403-17. bra, La Vordgine, y Cantaclaro." Coddou, Marcelo. "Seis preguntas a Manual Puig sobre su ultima novela: El besode la mujerarana."AmericanHispanist 2 (1977): 12-13. Echavarren, Robert. "El beso de la mujerarana y las metaforas del sujeto." Revista 44 (1978): 65-75. Iberoamericana Infield, Glenn B. Leni Riefenstahl:TheFallen Film Goddess.New York: Crowell, 1976. Kerr, Lucille. SuspendingFictions: Reading Novels by Manuel Puig. Urbana: U of Illinois P, 1987. McGrady, Donald. "Un cuento folklorico en Guiraldes y Carrasquilla." Thesaurus 26 (1971): 143-46. Media on Social Behavior. Meyrowitz, Joshua. No Senseof Place. The Impactof Electronic New York: Oxford UP, 1985. Mufioz, Elias Miguel. "El discurso de la sexualidad en El beso la mujerarana, de Manuel Puig." Revista Iberoamericana 52 (1986): 361-78. Nash, Jay Robert, and Stanley Ralph Ross. The Motion PictureGuide, 1927-1983. Chicago: Cinebooks, 1985. Puig, Manuel. El besode la mujerarana. Barcelona: Seix Barral, 1976. Pupo-Walker, Enrique. La vocacionliterariadel pensamientohistdricoen America. Madrid: Gredos, 1982. Tittler, Jonathan. "Order, Chaos, and Re-order: The Novels of Manuel Puig." 30 (1983): 187-201. KentuckyRomanceQuarterly Weber, Frances Wyers. "Manuel Puig at the Movies." Hispanic Review 49 (1981): 163-81.